2of3Former San Antonio Mayor and former Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Julian Castro, speaks during the Making the Grade: A Conversation with Julian, Joaquin, and Rosie Castro event held Monday Feb. 19, 2018 at the Prothro Theater in the Harry Ransom Center on the University of Texas at Austin campus in Austin, Tx.Photo: Edward A. Ornelas, Staff / San Antonio Express-News

Several years ago, my friend and I tuned into the nightly news. Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee dominated the newshour by praising President Barack Obama for his response to the Ebola crisis and criticizing U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz for his political leanings. As a conservative Republican, I turned to my friend, a progressive Democrat, to share my disagreements with the congresswoman and a defense of Cruz. Of course, he sided with the congresswoman and Obama. Quickly, our discussion deteriorated into a debate of gun control, healthcare, religious liberty and a score of other hot topic issues. We were both fuming, and I got up to leave. We finally glanced at each other, both looking down on the other as a moral inferior.

This past August, our paradigm shifted. In the wake of Hurricane Harvey, we again tuned into to the nightly news. However, this time we found something very different: Jackson Lee was actually embracing Cruz. The catastrophe of Harvey brought them together. They found value in each other as people and began a constructive dialogue on the rebuilding process. My friend and I took their cue. Again, we began a conversation on politics. This time, however, we saw each other as a disputant rather than an enemy. We first saw a friend and then somebody of merely ​different​ political leanings with valuable points to offer. In putting person before politics, we were able to approach the conversation with an open mind.

It was this epiphany — a desire to extend unity beyond times of crisis —that drove me to help build something bigger.

On March 25, hundreds of high school student of all stripes will convene at Bellaire High School to combat political polarization and promote dialogue. High School Republicans of Texas, Texas High School Democrats and Junior Statesmen of America are banding together to host the event — the Day of Unity.

Speakers ranging from U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz to U.S. Rep. U.S. Representative Joaquin Castro, D-San Antonio, will address the crowd. Mayor Sylvester Turner, a champion of the cause, will be present for a city proclamation and to support the Day of Unity’s message. In the first of its kind, Texas Republican Party Chairman James Dickey and Texas Democratic Party Chairman Gilberto Hinojosa will sit down together for a conversation on polarization. In addition to a number of breakout sessions, we also be bringing in Raffi Grinberg of Heterodox Academy’s OpenMind to expound on the pitfalls of polarization and foster mutual understanding, based upon the scholarship of Professor Jonathan Haidt.

Day of Unity, entirely organized and led by students, will bring change to our city community. As young people, we cannot vote or make significant political contributions. Our value may seem insignificant. Yet, the greatest social revolutions of this country have begun with young people. From the bottom up, high schoolers will be at the forefront of this culture shift.

This change in attitude is necessary. Too many believe in echo chambers. People would prefer to shield themselves from differing ideas and instead engage in a reductive and determinative politics — an ultimate moralizing of political views. This trend is reflected in data: only 14 percent of Republicans believe they have “a lot” of Democratic friends, and 9 percent of Democrats hold similarly toward Republicans. Almost a majority of Democrats (44 percent) and Republicans (45 percent) harbor unfavorable views toward members of the opposing party.

These numbers are not only unsettling and serve as a spur to action, but they also act as a threat to our liberal democracy. As columnist Bret Stephens delivered in a speech at the Lowry Institute, “​for free societies to function, the idea of open-mindedness can’t simply be a catchphrase or a dogma. It needs to be a personal habit, most of all when it comes to preserving an open mind toward those with whom we disagree.”

So that’s why we will be coming together to celebrate the words of Isaiah Berlin: “There are many different ends that men may seek and still be fully rational, fully men, capable of understanding each other and sympathizing and driving light from each other.”

In short, we will be uniting, in the same way that Cruz and Jackson Lee did in the face of crisis, but now to begin the conversation and recognize each other as good-willed Americans.

Adam Hoffman is a chairman of High School Republicans of Texas and is a senior at Robert M. Beren Academy.